OpenAI is backing a bipartisan effort in Congress to block China’s access to artificial intelligence chips and curb China’s access to chipmaking equipment, adding support to legislation gaining momentum after the scandal that toppled Jensen Huang as Nvidia Corp.’s chief executive officer.
The AI developer has been weighing for months whether to support a package of export-related bills and confirmed to lawmakers this week that it would support the measures, according to people familiar with the matter, who requested anonymity to describe a position that’s not yet public.
Congress is weighing three proposals that would seek to put restrictions on future sales of high-end chips, reduce the diversion of Nvidia’s AI processors and block China from accessing sophisticated machinery from ASML Holding NV. The measures would be attached to annual defense legislation that must pass before the end of the year.
Two lobbyists familiar with negotiations around that defense bill said Nvidia’s allies in Washington, including trade groups, this week have mobilized against the provisions, arguing they would harm the ecosystem of companies that are tied to Nvidia. But Nvidia itself has remained relatively mum as the defense bill effort gains steam.
Huang’s ouster as Nvidia chief on Thursday removed a longtime foe of stricter US export controls and diminished the chipmaker’s clout on Capitol Hill. Lawmakers have seized on revelations that Huang had an affair with an executive at Singapore-based Megaspeed named Alice Huang who US officials suspect was acting as a Chinese spy.
The Justice Department is conducting an espionage probe that includes looking at Alice Huang’s relationship with the then-Nvidia chief, Bloomberg has reported. Megaspeed is also under US investigation for possible export control violations, and the company has denied wrongdoing.
OpenAI’s support promises to add further weight to efforts to get the export legislation passed by year’s end, though the company’s backing was in the works well before the Nvidia scandal erupted. Buried in a policy document published earlier this month, OpenAI said it “continues to support” strengthening export controls.
Spokespeople for OpenAI declined to comment. Its archrival, Anthropic PBC, has previously expressed its support for tougher controls on AI chip exports and tightened access to chipmaking equipment.
Lawmakers with the most sway in Congress, from outgoing House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Louisiana Republican, to the expected speaker in January, New York Democrat Hakeem Jeffries, have voiced support this week for the measures. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat, reiterated his longtime support for the bills. Of the top four leaders in Congress, only Senate Majority Leader John Thune, a South Dakota Republican, remains publicly undecided.
Senator Jim Banks, an Indiana Republican who has led an effort alongside Massachusetts Democrat Elizabeth Warren to freeze existing rules dictating which chips Nvidia can sell to China for at least 18 months, said in a Wednesday X post that Congress has a “generational opportunity” to address pathways that China accesses US chips via the annual defense bill.
“While we need a full assessment of the damage done to our national security by recent revelations, we can begin today by setting a better course,” he said, hinting at reporting about Huang’s affairs that led to a board investigation which ultimately ousted him from CEO job on Thursday.
The episode is reviving complaints by Democratic lawmakers that the administration has failed to do enough to enforce existing export restrictions on AI chips since President Donald Trump’s return to office last year.
Huang and his company have been among the fiercest opponents of lawmakers’ attempts to tighten restrictions on what Nvidia is allowed to sell to China, enlisting allies in the Trump administration to push back against proposed new curbs in Congress.
Last year, the chipmaker played a key tole in killing the Gain AI Act, which stipulated that Nvidia or other AI chipmakers had to ensure there were no US customers seeking a chip before selling it to China. Huang’s departure increases the chances that all three measures pass this year, but his exit especially favors the AI Overwatch Act pushed by Banks and Warren.
Two other measures are also set for inclusion in the annual defense bill. The Match Act seeks to at further restricting the chip tools China is allowed to purchase while the Chip Security Act would direct the administration to require a security mechanism capable of preventing smuggling.
Lawmakers and administration officials continue to negotiate on the exact terms of the bills, and they could still be scrapped, especially if President Donald Trump threatens a veto. The administration has also been wary of any new policy that would imperil the delicate trade truce with China, which is set to expire on Jan. 10.
All three bills, but especially the Match Act, risk aggravating China, which has devised its own export controls on rare earth minerals that have been deployed before to retaliate against ratcheting US chips controls. In April, after the House Foreign Affairs Committee advanced the Match Act and other export control bills with bipartisan support, China’s Ministry of Commerce vowed to “take necessary measures” to safeguard its interests.
The bills, if enacted into law “would severely undermine the international economic and trade order and disrupt the stability of the global semiconductor industrial and supply chains,” the Ministry said.
Representative John Moolenaar, chairman of the House Select Committee on China, commented directly on Huang leaving Nvidia, saying that the company “must now change its corporate practices and appoint leadership that makes national security its top priority.”
The Michigan Republican added that Congress should “act quickly to pass bipartisan export control legislation in the year-end national defense bill.”
Eastland, Diaz and Birnbaum write for Bloomberg.
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